Socioeconomic class and the media

1
Socioeconomic class and the media
2
Socioeconomic class

• The United States has been called a classless
  society
• What does that mean?
• Is it true?
• What is class, anyway?

3
Socioeconomic class

• CLASS. Most sociologists use the term to refer to
  socioeconomic differences between groups of
  individuals which create differences in their
  life chances and power.
• (http//ryoung001.homestead.com/Sociology.html)

4
Depictions of class in US media

• The belief that the United States is a classless
  society or, alternatively, that most Americans
  are middle class persists . . . despite
  pervasive socioeconomic stratification
• (Bullock, Wyche and Williams, 2001)

5
Media facilitate classless society myth by

• Presenting the interests of the well-off (e.g.,
  stock, financial portfolios, and leisure time) as
  general concerns
• Downplaying the structural economic concerns
  (e.g., job security, income) of the working class
  and poor, and
• Emphasizing shared interclass concerns (e.g.,
  safety, crime)

6
(No Transcript)
7
(No Transcript)
8
Example

• Many media stories talk about the economy
  overall, citing recovery etc. but do not look
  at the differential class-based effect of various
  policies and events

9

• By dedicating little broadcast time or print
  space to stories that openly discuss class
  privilege, class-based power differences, and
  inequalities, the poor are either rendered
  invisible or portrayed in terms of
  characterological deficiencies and moral failings
  (e.g., substance abuse, crime, sexual,
  availability, violence).

10
Prime Time programming

• Early television included a number of
  working-class leads
• Ralph Cramden
• Marty
• More recent examples
• All in the Family
• Roseanne

11

• However, the tone of Prime Time is heavily
  white-collar/professional or upper class
• The main exceptions are law enforcement personnel
  in cop shows, reality shows and daytime talk
  shows
• Often connect poor and working class with
  negative depictions, low culture

12
Depictions of drug crimes

• Although the typical drug consumer and dealer
  is an employed, high-school-educated European
  American man, the majority of arrests depicted on
  reality-based crime programs involve African
  American and Latino men in densely populated,
  urban areas (Anderson, 1994).

13
Tabloid news shows

• Tabloid news shows tended to focus on stories
  involving upper-class criminals, particularly
  celebrities, whereas highbrow news programs
  were more likely to focus on stories involving
  working-class, unemployed criminals.
• Also tend to show rags to riches stories or the
  hollowness of wealth

14

• Limited number of stories on poverty on national
  newscasts.
• 11 per network per year 1981 to 1986

15
Two categories of stories(Entman, 1995)

• 239 stories
• 39 depicted poverty as a source of threat (e.g.,
  crime, drugs, and gangs)
• 61 portrayed poverty in terms of suffering (e.g.
  racial discrimination, poor health, and
  inadequate medical care)

16
Two frames(Iyengar, 1990)

• Episodic frame
• Personal circumstances of a poor individual or
  family
• More common
• Thematic frame
• Abstract, impersonal approach that looks at
  general poverty trends and public assistance

17
Framing effects

• Those exposed to episodic frames in an experiment
  were more likely to blame the poor for their own
  poverty and to perceive them as responsible for
  improving their socioeconomic status. Those
  exposed to thematic frames tended to make
  structural attributions for poverty and to regard
  the government as responsible for social change.

18
Framing effects

• Those exposed to episodic frames in an experiment
  were more likely to blame the poor for their own
  poverty and to perceive them as responsible for
  improving their socioeconomic status. Those
  exposed to thematic frames tended to make
  structural attributions for poverty and to regard
  the government as responsible for social change.

19

• Welfare recipients are among the . . . the most
  hated and stereotyped groups in contemporary
  society
• Only one among 17 stereotyped groups (feminists,
  housewives, retarded people, Blacks, migrant
  workers, etc.) that respondents both disliked and
  disrespected.
• Lacking both competence and warmth
• However, most common group of welfare recipients
  is poor children
• Media representations concentrate on their mothers

20
Content analysis of Newsweek 1993-1995

• De Goede (1996) found that the language used in
  the articles reinforced strong ingroup-outgroup
  class-based distinctions, simultaneously
  extolling the moral superiority of the middle
  class while degrading the values and behaviors of
  the poor.
• Single African American mothers and teenage
  mothers often the focus of these negative articles

21
Depictions of welfare mothers

• immoral and neglectful, responsible for their
  own poverty as well as the breakdown of the
  nuclear family
• the poster mother for welfare reform spends her
  days painting her nails, smoking cigarettes, and
  feeding Pepsi to her baby

22
Teenage mothers

• Content analysis of over 700 newspaper and
  magazine stories
• Two types of stories
• Wrong girl stories emphasized flawed psychology
  of teenage mothers
• Wrong family stories focused on violation of
  traditional two-parent ideal

23
Soap operas

• On soap operas, single mothers are typically
  portrayed as White, upper-middle-class
  professionals, with nurturing male friends and an
  abundance of reliable child care providers
  (Larson, 1996).
• Teenage girls who were heavy viewers of soap
  operas were more likely than lighter viewers to
  underestimate the relationship between single
  motherhood and poverty and to overestimate the
  percentage of single mothers in high-paying jobs.

24
Connection to race

• Content analyses show a great overrepresentation
  of African Americans in depictions of the poor
• Gilens (1996) content analysis of three major
  news magazines found African Americans were
  represented in 62 of stories about poverty
  though they comprised 29 of poor (no more info
  available)
• Asian Americans, stereotyped as hard working and
  conscientious, rarely show up in stories about
  the poor
• European Americans greatly overestimate the
  percentage of African Americans who are poor

25
Stereotypes in media and popular culture

• African American menmembers of threatening and
  violent underclass
• African American womenwelfare queens or as
  ignorant, promiscuous women caught in a
  self-perpetuating cycle of dependency
• Emphasis on African Americans tends to render
  white poor invisible in popular culture

26
Post welfare reform

• April-July 1999 newspapers
• 412 articles
• 24 contained at least some overt discussion of
  race/ethnicity
• African American articles
• 8 focused on chronic poverty and single
  motherhood
• 5 focused on fraud
• 6 highlighted the lives of African Americans who
  had triumphed over poverty

27
Welfare reform

• 60 of articles took balanced/neutral tone
• 32 positive (supported services and programs for
  the poor)
• 8 negative (fraud, drug addiction, etc.)

28
Welfare recipients

• 60 portrayed poor as deserving of support
  (hard-working families with children in need)
• 17 portrayed poor negatively (drug users,
  neglectful parents)
• 14 neutral
• 8 mixed